VIDEO CHALLENGE! What do you do? Make a video!

Rachel’s English community! It’s time for another Rachel’s English video challenge!

Several months ago, you all sent in 50 videos introducing yourself for the Rachel’s English

Introduce Yourself video challenge! It was absolutely amazing to meet all of you! And,

it’s time for your next challenge.

A very common question that you’ll get asked in the US after you introduce yourself is,

“What do you do?” Let’s see some people answering this question.

>> Hey. I’m Steve, and I’m a carpenter.

>> Hi. I’m Tom, and I’m a Rachel’s English teacher.

>> What do you do, Krista? >> I’m a music teacher. I teach pre-K through

6th grade music. >> Oh cool!

Other kinds of answers you may hear: I’m retired. I’m a student at the University

of Florida studying Chemical Engineering. I just finished school and I’m looking for

work.

So, my challenge to you is, make a video saying what you do in English. Learn to introduce

your occupation or field of study. Go ahead and say your name too: I’m Rachel, and I

teach English as a second language and make YouTube videos.

Last time there were a lot of ways to get the video to me: Twitter, Facebook. This time

it’s different! There’s only one way to turn in your videos. Upload your video to

YouTube, and send the link to this email address: [email protected]. Put “Video Challenge”

in the subject. In a couple of weeks, I’ll compile everyone’s videos for the results

video. So get your camera ready! I can’t wait to learn more about you.

So practice your English and make me this video!

And, it’s a different day now. Obviously I’m at home. And, I’ve been thinking about

this. I’ve been thinking about how the first question an American will ask when you introduce

yourself is “What do you do?” Um, our culture seems very focused on people’s occupation.

And I wonder what it’s like in your culture. Um, I, I don’t think that this only happens

in America, but maybe it does. In your culture, what is the first question that someone asks

you when they’ve just met you? Or maybe there isn’t one. I should also say that

I don’t think that this question is the first question asked all the time, period,

in American culture, um, but it’s definitely one of the main questions. Um, so I’m curious:

what do you think of that? Is it off-putting to you that people feel like they need to

know what you do for work in order to start to understand you? And what’s it like in

your culture?

Anyway, for better or for worse, that’s how it is in America. So let’s do go ahead

and practice these sentences and make a video.

That’s it, and thanks so much

for using Rachel’s English.